u/Past-Jeweler-8385

I’m a returning violinist in my 30s (started playing at age 6, took the last 5 years off) and while my left hand came back easily a bizarre thing is happening with my bow hand. My thumb is staying in the right place but my other fingers are creeping up. By the time I’m halfway through a piece my pinky is like practically in line with the eye and my forefinger is at the top of the winding (and very spaced from the other fingers). I don’t recall having this issue before - i will say i recently got a new bow. Not sure if that would make a difference though.

Ive tried putting double sided tape on the eye to keep my ring finger there but its not working. Tried consciously forcing the fingers to stay and for my thumb to stay bent but that doesn’t seem to work either.

Does anyone have any other tricks to try to keep the fingers in place? It’s like a demonic force is pulling them up lol and it’s messing with my sound, wrist mobility, and at this point my head. I feel like a fluid wrist comes so naturally to many players and I’m just really struggling.

I’m a returning violinist in my 30s (started playing at age 6, took the last 5 years off) and while my left hand came back easily a bizarre thing is happening with my bow hand. My thumb is staying in the right place but my other fingers are creeping up. By the time I’m halfway through a piece my pinky is like practically in line with the eye and my forefinger is at the top of the winding (and very spaced from the other fingers). I don’t recall having this issue before - i will say i recently got a new bow. Not sure if that would make a difference though.

Ive tried putting double sided tape on the eye to keep my ring finger there but its not working. Tried consciously forcing the fingers to stay and for my thumb to stay bent but that doesn’t seem to work either. Does anyone have any other tricks to try to keep the fingers in place? It’s like a demonic force is pulling them up lol and it’s messing with my sound, wrist mobility, and at this point my head. I feel like a fluid wrist comes so naturally to many players and I’m just really struggling.

Tl;dr is that my SO and I (early-mid 30s) began our relationship in his family’s hometown around covid, and our whole lives thereafter felt like they centered around my in laws. At first I felt like it was fun, and I enjoyed the company. It was after we got married two years into living together that the cracks began to show, and I started to see the judgemental, suffocating, cliquey and enmeshed behavior of the family. My SO is a huge people pleaser, and has been really oblivious. Admittedly I was naive for a while and didn’t speak up until I already feel frustrated. We’ve had a lot of tough convos around it, and I’ve even questioned our marriage at the most intense of times. He practically deifies his family so I have to be careful of how I phrase things.

It took some more time to finally move out of state (which despite the fact it was both of our decision, some of his family pit me as the bad guy which was infuriating), and 5 years later we are finally able to have our own life. I still feel super on edge, and even the smallest things like my in laws threatening to visit spike my blood pressure. I know it may take some time but I just want to feel normal again. I also always hear “wait til you have kids it’ll be way worse” but I’d like to find a healthy balance and reset some boundaries and my nervous system.

Has anyone been in a similar ish situation and had success getting back to feeling a sense of equilibrium in their life and marriage? And maybe reframed their relationship with the in laws?